Rory McIlroy leads the British challenge as Tiger Woods attempts to reclaim his place at the pinnacle

When Tiger Woods pitches up at the HSBC Championship in Abu Dhabi in three
weeks’ time, he will encounter a change of golfing landscape every bit as
dramatic as the one that turned this swathe of Arabian desert into
glistening fairways.

Dawn of a new era: Rory McIlroy has shown his Tiger qualities in an emphatic win at the US OpenPhoto: GETTY

For Woods, whose dominance of golf once seemed impregnable, has found himself supplanted at the summit of his sport. So emphatic was last season’s shift that the 14-time major champion fell at one stage to 58th in the world rankings. A restorative victory at the Chevron World Challenge in Los Angeles — his first anywhere for 761 days — suggested the beginnings of a comeback, but Woods could discover that the path to long-term renaissance is blocked by three British pretenders to the throne he once owned.

None reflect this change of guard quite as vividly as Rory McIlroy. The young Ulsterman’s majestic eight-stroke victory in the US Open at Congressional last June was redolent of Woods in his pomp. Indeed, no sooner had McIlroy posted a record score of 16 under par than he received a text message from Woods to say: “What a performance from start to finish well done.” Then, of course, Woods must confront in 2012 the challenge posed by the walking metronome that is Luke Donald. In 2011, Donald was ominously Woods-like by virtue of his merciless consistency. Four victories and a barely human haul of 20 top-10 finishes from 27 starts not only sealed his accomplishment as the first man to win orders of merit on both sides of the Atlantic, but also cemented his standing as the world No 1 by a distance.

Woods has long tailored his limited schedule around the major championships, and this year is likely to be little different as he resumes his quest to match Jack Nicklaus’ mythical mark of 18 wins. Come the Masters in April, however, Donald will represent a formidable adversary, fuelled by a determination to fulfil his remarkable talent with a first major title. The same could be said of fellow Englishman Lee Westwood, the third member of an outstanding British triumvirate.

While Westwood was forced to play the bridesmaid for much of 2011, eclipsed by McIlroy’s flourishes and Donald’s sustained brilliance, he turns 39 this year and is hell-bent on shedding that hoary tag as the best player never to have won a major. Such a breakthrough would seldom have been more richly-deserved. Westwood’s end-of-season displays — first in shooting a course-record 62 in Sun City, then in reaching the halfway stage of his final event in Thailand at 20 under par — confirmed the view, long advanced by his caddie Billy Foster, that there is no finer ball-striker in the business.

Foster was once on the bag for Woods, so his opinion is worth noting. But for all Westwood’s qualities, the most mouth-watering duel of 2012, not to mention the most expressive of the old order versus the new, is that of Woods against McIlroy. The similarities between the two are stark, whether in their freakish gifts, their sheer precocity at a tender age, or their contributions to transforming the way that golf is played.

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McIlroy demonstrated by his US Open triumph that he possessed that Tiger hallmark of explosiveness, never even entertaining the notion of playing defensively as he dipped under Woods’ tournament record score of 12 under par, set at Pebble Beach in 2000. How dramatically the anguish of Augusta had been erased. Barely two months earlier, McIlroy had wilted in the least forgiving crucible en route to a closing round of 80, throwing away a four-shot Masters lead. Now, courtesy of a nerveless masterclass at the very next major, he was being bracketed with the game’s greatest player.

It represented an extraordinary tribute to the prodigy from Northern Ireland, who had been so inspired by the experience of watching Woods’ 1997 Masters win as a seven year-old in Belfast. Take this eulogy from Ernie Els: “He’s a future No 1, without a doubt. He can really change history again.”

Or these effusive words from his compatriot and great friend Graeme McDowell: “He’s the best player I’ve ever seen. I didn’t have a chance to play with Tiger when he was in his prime, and this guy is the best I’ve ever seen, simple as that. He’s great for golf. Perhaps we’re ready for golf’s next superstar, and maybe Rory is it.”

Donald happens to be of the same mind, controversially arguing at last month’s Dubai World Championship that McIlroy had superior natural ability to Woods. On the strength of pure results, we ought to be place Donald at the forefront of the sea change taking place in golf - and yet it would be a stretch to identify him, at 34, as a multiple major winner-in-waiting.

McIlroy, still only 22, just might be that man.

Not for nothing has he been mentored by the most prolific major champion of them all. McIlroy and Nicklaus have already met for detailed conversations at Muirfield Village in Ohio, with the ’Golden Bear’ purporting to be impressed by the young man’s attitude or “moxie”.

What lends added piquancy to the approaching match-up of Woods and McIlroy is the palpable rivalry between the pair. McIlroy memorably doused the fuel at the last Ryder Cup when, alluding to the fall-out from Woods’ sex scandal, he said: “After all that has happened in the last 12 months, a little bit of that aura has probably gone.” That perceived provocation invited the acerbic reply: “Be careful what you wish for.”

As if the prospect of a Woods revival and another McIlroy surge did not make 2012 enticing enough, the season promises to take a dramatic turn in the Ryder Cup at Medinah in September. Europe captain José María Olazábal is so fortunate as to have the world’s four top-ranked players - in Donald, Westwood, McIlroy and Germany’s Martin Kaymer - at his disposal, and his side should have too much firepower for an American team in transition.

First, though, there is the headline billing of Woods and McIlroy to savour amid the sands of Abu Dhabi. The anticipation surrounding Woods’ first appearance there is such that he is rumoured to be receiving a record $4 million appearance fee. How he performs against the heir apparent from Holywood should offer the first gauge of whether golf’s changing of the guard is here to stay.

Roll of honour Luke Donald for winning both the European Tour and PGA Tour money lists; Rory McIlroy’s US Open victory.

Highlights The final day at the Masters was one of unforgettable chaos as McIlroy folded, Tiger Woods charged, and Charl Schwartzel won at the 18th.